The Climate of Honduras
Honduras is a democratic republic in Central America and its 43,200 square miles of terrain is a mountainous interior with flat coastal plains on both the Caribbean Sea and Pacific. Its rainforests, mangrove swamps and coral reefs have huge biodiversity significance and the country has a number of UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
As a country, the climate of Honduras is described as tropical, with all land mass falling within the tropics but there are four distinct physiographic regions where the climate diverts from the standard definition; the Caribbean Lowlands, the Pacific Lowlands, the Tropical Interior
The Caribbean Lowlands
The climate of Honduras in the coastal plains on the Caribbean Sea is typically tropical with consistent high temperatures and high humidity. Temperatures have an average daytime high between 28°C and 32°C. Rainfall is heaviest between September and February then distributed fairly evenly throughout the remainder of the year. The Honduran Caribbean coast is also subject to hurricanes.
The Pacific Lowlands
The Pacific coastal plains are similar to those on the Caribbean, experiencing a tropical climate but with a more distinct wet and dry tropical climate. The dry season is between November and April, with the latter having the year’s warmest average temperatures.
The Tropical Interior
As with all tropical areas, the climate of Honduras relates to elevation.
Applicable to land that lies between 1,000 and 2,000 metres above sea level, the mountainous and forested interior of Honduras enjoys a pleasant temperate climate with an average high temperature of 30°C in April and coolest of 25°c in January. The higher land areas, above 2,000 feet also enjoy a temperate climate but with a greater extreme at the cooler end of the scale with temperatures that can fall to near freezing at night and early morning frosts.
Leave a Reply